Fresco, Delhi: Napolitano Festival

I had not been to Janpath, Connaught Place for a quite a while – it was a place I used to rather enjoy going to. Therefore, it was a welcome invite to be going to Fresco in Janpath for a chef interaction with Brand Chef Ankit Mangla for the Napolitano Festival. The festival has been on from 30^th July and will run up to 23^rd August.

I was received warmly and told that we were waiting for the other invited food bloggers to join in. I was served a red wine (Rose) Sangria with mixed fruits, which had a nice fruity taste, thanks to the fruits which were soaked for 24 hours in it. Then came the bite sized Greek salad served in tablespoons, topped with fresh feta cheese. I had just finished digging into mushroom in creamy sauce and tomato bruschetta when it was announced that the chef, who has been trained in Italy, was going to show us how to make pizzas from scratch.
There was a big table laden with all possible vegetarian and non-vegetarian toppings that could go on a pizza. We were told that a Napolitano Pizza is a traditional Italian pizza which has to be hand pressed (the trick being in using the first three fingers of each hand simultaneously), topped with pizza sauce made from fresh tomatoes and imported tinned Italian sweet tomatoes and, as far as possible, with the freshest of toppings which should be as less as possible (being a thin crust pizza). We were further told that there are three types of pizza dough used – regular flour, whole wheat and multi grain.
Thereafter, we were engaged in a cookery class where we were made to don aprons and flatten out our dough with dry flour on the table using our hands. I must say it wasn’t the easiest task in the world to do keeping in mind the fact that we had to get a round shape. After this, we had to thinly spread the red pizza sauce evenly over the pizza avoiding the sides. Thereafter, the pizza is topped with cheese and toppings according of our choice. Me being me, who loves a loaded pizza, I piled on the veggies, pepperoni, roasted meats and cold cuts on my pizza and slowly strayed away from an authentic Italian pizza. After all these exertions, my pizza and those of others were baked in a pre-heated oven with the temperature maintained between 275-350 degree.
The basic difference between a thin crust vs. a Napolitano is that a thin crust is rolled out with a pin and uses locally procured tomatoes. A Napolitano, on the other hand, has to be hand pressed into the required shape and size. It uses the sweet tinned tomatoes from Italy and has to have light toppings.

It was an interesting class, where we all had fun. We realized that a chef’s job is not as easy as it looks – it took us almost 15 minutes to just hand press one pizza. Do the pizzas taste different ? Yes ! And I do have to mention that I particularly enjoyed the Shrimp Diavola Pizza prepared by Fresco which had prawns, garlic flakes, cherry tomatoes and fresh red chili.

If a non-pizza making expert like me could enjoy what my fellow food bloggers & I dished out for ourselves under the expert guidance of the Fresco Chef, imagine how much better the pizzas served by Fresco must be !

RATINGS(OUT OF 5) :

FOOD: 3.5 |AMBIENCE: 3.5 | SERVICE:3.5 | OVERALL: 3.5

MEAL FOR TWO: Rs. 1,400 approx. | CREDIT CARD: YES | TIMINGS: 12 Noon to 11.30 pm  |WHEEL CHAIR ACCESSIBLE: YES.

ADDRESS: 78 , JANPATH CONNAUGHT PLACE , DELHI | TELEPHONE :011-43620222